


Fantasia Revisited

by dustandroses



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: A Spell Gone Wrong, Community: tamingthemuse, Disney, Disney Homage, Fantasia, Ficlet, Gen, Humor, Original Character - Freeform, POV: Xander, The Sorcerer's Apprentice, Willow's Spell
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-21
Updated: 2014-04-21
Packaged: 2018-01-20 05:22:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 998
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1498213
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dustandroses/pseuds/dustandroses
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A broom can be a deadly weapon in the wrong hands.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fantasia Revisited

**Author's Note:**

> **Prompt Notes:** Inspiration for this fic taken from the Live Journal community: Tamingthemuse prompt #404: [Besom](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Besom) (Check the link for a description, and here are some [pics](https://www.google.com/search?q=besom&safe=off&client=firefox-a&hs=6uo&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&channel=sb&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=vIZTU_rfIq62sAT5i4DABg&ved=0CAkQ_AUoAg&biw=1437&bih=836).)  
>  **Notes:** [Walt Disney](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walt_Disney)'s original [Fantasia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fantasia_%28film%29) video can be found here: [The Sorcerer's Apprentice](http://youtu.be/mHTnJNGvQcA).  
>  In Latin, “State, state!” means “Stop!”  
> Thanks to Ozsaur, as usual, for the inspiration for this story - well, her and Walt Disney, of course...  
> 

“Be careful, don’t spook it.”

Spike gave Willow a nasty glare. “It can hear what you’re saying, you know.”

“You gave it intelligence?” Xander asked. “Willow, why did you give a _broom_ intelligence?”

“Well, it needed to know what to sweep up and what not to, so I had to make sure it could understand me.” Willow bit her lip. “Everybody left me all alone, and I had customers, and I had to clean, and I hadn’t even started my homework…” Obviously, neither Spike nor Xander looked remotely sympathetic, because Willow continued. “Did I mention I was all by myself? I didn’t know what to do.”

“So you brought to life the sequel to ‘The Sorcerer’s Apprentice’? Good job, Wils. Let’s just hope Disney doesn’t sue.” Willow started to reply, but Xander wasn’t done yet. “You do remember that the original didn’t turn out well for the apprentice, don’t you?” 

“I’m not a beginner. I know what I’m doing!” Xander just looked at her, and Willow cringed. “Giles is going to kill me.”

“ _I’m_ going to kill you if you don’t bloody well _shut up_.” Spike took a step to the left, and the broom countered with a step to the right. When he growled at it, the broom started to tremble, the gray birch twigs tied to its head shaking slightly.

“Don’t hurt it!”

Spike looked at her incredulously. “Don’t hurt it? It’s a bloody broom!”

“It’s not bloody yet,” Xander pointed out.

“Shut up, both of you!”

The door opened, the bell ringing cheerfully. It startled the broom, which made a run for the backroom. Spike got there first, blocking the door, and it reversed its course, headed for the front. They caught up to it as it slipped behind the counter. Leaning up against the cabinet, it struck a casual pose, as if it belonged there. 

“Xander, have you been singing again?” Anya stood by the front door, a serious frown on her face.

Xander started, he’d totally forgotten someone had come in the front door. His mind had obviously been elsewhere. 

“There are customers running out of the store with no bags in their hands. Are you scaring all the customers away again?”

He rolled his eyes. There were more important things than his singing voice at stake here. “No, An, I’m not scaring the customers.” He watched in panic as Anya headed for the register. “Don’t go behind the counter!”

“Why not?” She set her bags down on the cabinet along the back wall. That put her entirely too close to the broom. 

She gasped, taking a step back. “That broom is staring at me. Why is that broom staring at me?” She paused, her eyes squinting as she took a closer look. “Is that one of the new ones, with the runes carved into the handle?”

“There are runes on the handle?” Willow sounded relieved. “No wonder the spell went all whacky. Who puts runes on the handles of brooms?”

Obviously it didn’t matter that the broom had developed a life of its own, as long as it wasn’t her fault.

“They came that way,” Anya explained. “I tried to figure them out; I think they’re supposed to make any spells you weave while using the brooms work better.” 

Anya took a step in the broom’s direction, but stepped back rapidly when it rustled its twigs at her. Spike took the opportunity to casually sidle closer.

“It moved! There are brooms that move on their own? Why should I sweep the apartment, if there are brooms that can do it for me?” she demanded.

“It’s not _supposed_ to be moving, Anya. We’re trying to catch it so we can stop it from moving.”

The broom shook all over. Anya gasped, and ran over to Xander, grabbing his arm.

“Would you people shut the bloody hell up? I’m never going to catch it this way!”

“Maybe we should make it a deal,” Anya suggested. “We won’t stop it from moving, if it will do the sweeping. Think how much more money I could make if I didn’t have to clean the store!”

Spike growled, and tackled the broom to the floor behind the counter. Xander could hear a scuffle, and random things started flying through the air – dust bunnies, paperclips, a register receipt, a couple of birch twigs. Suddenly, the room went silent. Xander craned his neck, but he wasn’t really interested in getting too close.

Suddenly, Spike roared, and jumped up. “The bloody thing bit me!” he yelled, shaking his hand. “You gave it teeth!” It started striking Spike with its handle. “Ow! Stop that!”

He ran out from behind the counter, with the broom in close pursuit. “Look out!” 

Spike ran past, and hid behind the table. It stopped when it saw them all – swaying from side to side, taking them all in. When it charged, Xander grabbed Anya and Willow by the hands.

“Run!” 

They ran down one aisle, and back up the next, the three of them holding onto each other frantically, with Spike following close behind. The next time they ran that direction, Xander headed for the counter, and the hatchet he knew was hidden in the cabinet underneath the cash register. 

Just as they passed it, Giles walked in the door. “Watch out, Giles! It’s alive!” Xander shouted as he ran by. He turned back as he rounded the corner of the counter, in time to see Giles step into the broom’s path, his hand held out in front of him, like a shield.

“State, state!” he shouted in Latin. 

The broom clattered to the floor at his feet.

In the silence that followed, the only noise was the sound of their labored breaths. But that didn’t last too long.

“What the bloody hell is going on here?” 

“Ummm…” Willow looked at Xander, her eyes begging him to say something - anything.

“An homage to Walt Disney?” he said, hesitantly.

Giles rolled his eyes. “I need a drink.”


End file.
